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11.44 pm
Mr. Vernon Coaker (Gedling): I rise to support the Bill. As my hon. Friend the Member for South Thanet (Dr. Ladyman) said earlier, it is clear that some of the detail will have to be fleshed out during its Committee and other stages, but, in general, the Bill is well thought-out and necessary.
Indeed, the majority of our constituents, having seen the events in Charleroi and Holland, would find it surprising if we were not seen to be taking the quick and decisive action that the Government are taking now. In the real world, they would find it bewildering that their own Parliament did not regard the problem with the same urgency as they did.
I want to make three general statements about the Bill. I very much agree with the point that the hon. Member for West Chelmsford (Mr. Burns) made. The arguments about the Bill concentrate on the clash between the rights of individuals and on infringements of human rights. It is incumbent upon us as a Parliament to recognise that society restricts the rights of the individual. In a democracy, there is always a clash between individual rights and the public interest. The rights of the individual must not be protected at the expense of creating contempt for the law and allowing major public disturbances. In curtailing the civil liberties of some, we are protecting the common good.
What is the common good? Here, the hon. Gentleman made a valid point. The common good is the right of the vast majority of individuals to carry on their lawful
business. It is the right of individuals to drink and enjoy themselves without fear of attack and without fear of violence around them. It is the right of the vast majority of individuals to be protected from xenophobic and racist abuse. It is the common good for the vast majority of individuals to be able to go to football matches without fearing for their personal safety.Our constituents, the people of this country, demand that we respect the rights of the majority and do not respect the right of the individual to the extent that the rights of the majority are curtailed. Very often, we reverse the law so that the law-abiding majority feel that they are being persecuted in order to protect the rights of the individual. If we do not get this right, as we have seen in debates over the past few weeks, the whole law is brought into disrepute, and we, too, are brought into disrepute, because ordinary people ask, "How can you do these things, which do not relate to our experience in our everyday lives?"
Mr. Lilley: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that critics of the Bill want to protect innocent people from being wrongly punished? Is he saying that it is all right to have a few innocent people wrongly punished so that the majority do not have to see offensive pictures on their television screens?
Mr. Coaker: What I am saying is that, sometimes, the law protects a few individuals at the expense of the vast majority of law-abiding citizens. That is what we want to get right.
Secondly, I ask my right hon. Friend to discuss with governments in the rest of Europe ensuring that when people commit wrongs in other countries they feel the force of the law in those countries. Failure in this respect undermines the situation. I cannot remember the statistics, but I know that large numbers of people were arrested in Belgium and deported having been guilty of the most serious offences--everything that we saw on television, with chairs being thrown across squares, bars being wrecked, people being attacked. Yet how many of those involved have been prosecuted for any crime? Hardly any.
Unless we can ensure that people's actions have a consequence, they will hold the law in contempt. We must make sure that wherever the law is broken, whether here or abroad, those concerned are brought to book. I urge my right hon. Friend to do all he can to continue to speak to other European Governments, so that many of the hooligans guilty of the actions we saw on our television screens can no longer be at home boasting of their achievements abroad and gaining ridiculous kudos for them, suffering no consequences for their actions. Being able to continue to do that would encourage them to carry on and act with impunity.
My third and final point is a general one. We can take immediate measures about this problem, as the Bill does. We can talk about crime, say that we need more police on the street and do some of the things that I have mentioned on previous occasions. However, we must also recognise the peculiar English problem that some of our young people have. Why do we generate this xenophobic, racist culture in so many of our communities? Why do some of our young men respond to a patriotism and pride in our country that we all feel--none more so than everyone here--and the desire to support their national
team when they go abroad by getting drunk, fighting and hurling xenophobic abuse? That is a fundamental question for Parliament and the country. The behaviour at football matches abroad is often the same as that in our cities, streets and towns. We must understand why that happens and do something about it.I hope that we can build a consensus to do something about the problem. We must tackle the problem of why such a xenophobic, racist attitude is prevalent among a significant number of our young men. Otherwise, while all the measures that we take will have some impact and make a difference to some problems, and a few more football matches may take place without that sort of behaviour, we will not get to the crux of the problem because we will simply be treating the symptoms.
I say this with a great deal of passion. As right hon. and hon. Members know from the debates that I generate in the House, we have a very real problem with anti-social behaviour, racism and xenophobia. My right hon. Friend talks about the need to conduct research into the problem. I hope that the Home Office can carry out that very urgent task and do something as quickly as possible. The results could contribute to the debate about the problem in addition to all the other steps that we are taking, in the Bill and elsewhere.
11.52 pm
Mr. Roger Gale (North Thanet): When he was playing to the gallery at the end of his speech, the Home Secretary waved around a press release from my right hon. Friend the Member for Richmond, Yorks (Mr. Hague), claiming that we would pledge support for controlling football hooliganism. The right hon. Gentleman then sought to pray in aid that, as if he had a right to support for a bad Bill.
Marseille was two years ago. My right hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield (Sir N. Fowler) introduced his amendment to the Crime and Disorder Bill nearly two years ago. Some of us came to the House and debated this subject on the morning of Friday 16 April 1999. It ill behoves the Home Secretary to come to the House and, because a football match is being played in the autumn, expect and demand support for bad legislation that he is trying to force through on the hoof. He does not deserve support.
I have very little time and I wish to make some serious points. However, the Home Secretary needs to take it on board that if he wants any support for the Bill, he will have to do a lot more homework to get it into a fit shape to go through either House of Parliament. If he does not, he does not deserve, and will not receive, support from many on the Conservative and Liberal Democrat Benches and, I suspect--if they are honest--from many on his own Benches as well.
The Bill, as is blindingly obvious, has no writ in Scotland and Northern Ireland. Any of the people who wish to travel abroad and who live in the north of England can easily go to Glasgow, Edinburgh or Belfast and travel with impunity from there to any place on the continent. That is a flaw in the Bill. It is no good the Home Secretary saying that his writ does not run there. If this legislation is to have any meaning at all, he must get to grips with the real problem, instead of paying lip service in the hope
that, somewhere out there, people will think that he is talking a good war so he must be acting a good war against what we all recognise is a real problem.Most people who go abroad leave through the gateway county of Kent--one of whose constituencies I have the privilege to represent. I am concerned about the measure's potential effects on the passenger service from the port of Ramsgate and its current effect on Dover. As the Home Secretary signally failed to get to grips with the problems posed by asylum seekers and economic migrants, the county constabulary of Kent has its work cut out trying to control illegal contraband and illegal immigration with insufficient resources.
Above and beyond all the points raised by my right hon. and hon. Friends and by some Labour Members, I have a serious question for the Home Secretary, who is leaving the Chamber. Before he does so, will he pay attention to this point? He is the Home Secretary; he has responsibility for the constabulary. When will he provide the resources for the constabulary of Kent to police the port of Dover--not for only one day of the year, not for five days, but for 365 days?
My hon. Friend the Member for West Chelmsford (Mr. Burns) said that we should not be too concerned with the civil liberties of a minority. Some of us realise that, as the overwhelming majority of people in this country go through Dover on their way to the continent, we need to be concerned with the civil liberties of the majority--all those innocent people who could be caught by this measure. That includes every Member of the House and every member of their family who goes abroad wholly innocently. Under the measure, any of those people could be picked up by the constabulary of Kent and held overnight. The Home Secretary and the Minister of State may think that is satisfactory, but I do not. The Bill does not deserve our support.
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